New trainees at DLA Piper are being offered £10,000 to delay starting work until August 2021. Staggered start dates have been implemented at the international firm, which recruits around 70 graduates each year – one of the City’s biggest intakes, according to the Law Gazette.

Applications are now open for the LawCareersNetLIVE careers conferences taking place in November and December later this year.

One year after launching its Wellbeing at the Bar online resource, the Bar Council is introducing a certification system for chambers, inns of court and other organisations which adopt mental health and wellbeing policies. 

A new commercial awareness competition for students at non-Russell Group universities has attracted sponsorship from 12 City law firms.

You may find yourself being quizzed on your knowledge of economic affairs in vac scheme interviews, so it pays to be prepared. Here’s a selection from the past week to get you started.

International law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) is championing wellbeing efforts in the legal industry by offering its employees time-off bonuses.  

Premier international law firm Milbank LLP has launched a new training pathway – leveraged finance track – for candidates with “a clear and committed interest in leveraged finance”. 

The Bar Council has this week hosted the second Bar Placement Week in Leeds and Manchester, following the scheme’s success in 2014.

National law firm Ashfords has launched a six-year solicitor apprenticeship as an alternative route to qualifying as a solicitor. 

The University of Law has announced a new payment option, allowing full-time postgraduate students to pay by monthly direct debit.

Oxford Brookes University announced earlier this week that it intends to stop offering the LPC in summer this year.

The government is in talks with BPP Law School over plans to provide a legal apprenticeship scheme which will allow aspiring lawyers to qualify into the profession without first having to complete a university degree.

More flexible pathways to qualifying as a solicitor and "rigorous standards" are at the heart of the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s reform programme, its director of education and training has said.